Ronan saluted, then teleported away.
“So?” she prompted.
“Let me worry about this. You’re dealing with grief and—”
“And trying to figure out this puzzle so that my father’s sacrifice won’t be for naught takes my mind off my pain. Please.”
Raiden shook his head. She wasn’t going to bloody leave this alone. And he couldn’t just let her ache.
“I found nothing. Just an update to
She shrugged. “The older generation cares about such things, you know. Father loved his work passionately, enjoyed marking the passing of time by recording every magical family’s momentous occasions.”
“I can’t imagine sitting down to read page after page of someone’s family tree.”
His last word echoed around the room, and they both froze. Raiden’s thoughts started whirling.
“Tree?” she choked. “Father kept family trees for a living. Maybe…”
“… we’re not dealing with a real tree.” He rushed across the room and grabbed her shoulders—and tried to ignore the sting of desire that threatened to overwhelm him every time he touched her. “Do you know of any family tree that’s kept secret?”
“No. He took care to correspond with all families, no matter how Privileged or Deprived. Most people volunteered their family changes. Deaths, while sad, were always promptly reported. Matings, usually happy occasions, as well. He didn’t always hear of a mate breaking right away, but often within a few months.”
“Can you think of any circumstances in which that wasn’t the case?”
“No.” She paused. “Wait! Just one. That same trip when my father took me to that mysterious office in London I mentioned. The evening before, he took me to a hospital. It was quite late, and we met with a human couple. The woman had just given birth. She held her daughter once, cried, then gave the child to other humans. Her husband pleaded with my father to strike the child’s name from his books. I remember asking him who the family was, why he would ever record a human birth, and why they wanted to keep the baby a secret. He never answered except to say that I was never to repeat the incident to anyone. He never spoke of the humans again. That’s the only secret I can recall.”
Raiden paced the airy room. “You went to the hospital
“But what?” She shrugged. “Why would Mathias have a sudden interest in a human baby girl born over twenty-five years ago?”
“I don’t know. But if there’s a connection, I’m going to find it. And deal with it. Mathias isn’t coming near you ever again.”
Chapter Five
Raiden made a call to Bram in low, secretive tones that infuriated her. This was about her family and her future. Did he really think he was going to keep her in the dark?
When he rang off and turned to leave, she grabbed him by the shirt. “I’m going with you.”
He shook his head. “Too dangerous.”
“That’s what you’ve decided?” she asked tartly.
Raiden sent her a wary glance. “I have.”
“Too bad for you, then. You’re not my mate.” She shrugged. “You’ve no right to decide anything for me.”
His icy blue eyes narrowed. “The child you carry is mine. I have every right to care about your well- being.”
“Care, yes. Decide, no. Either I go with you or I resume this search alone. If Bram Rion knew that easily how to find the office my father most likely visited, then someone else will as well. Unlike you, I’m more likely to have privileges to enter, given that I’m his next of kin. What reason will you use to access his paperwork?”
Raiden clenched his jaw. “Bram is a member of the Council. I’m sure he can pull a few strings for me.”
He was right, Tabitha realized. In fact, they both were. Between his connections and her familial relation, they should have no trouble viewing whatever her father might have kept in the building.
“Should we be wasting time arguing about this, or should we be working together? What could happen, really? It’s a Council building in the middle of the day. Others should be there. We’re doing nothing wrong.”
Raiden hesitated, looking like he was about to refuse.
“Hello?” Nathanial Wolvesey called.
Tabitha shivered. Raiden’s father had looked at her all too sexually, given that she carried his son’s child.
Raiden watched her with an unblinking gaze. “What’s the matter? Did my father say something to you that made you uncomfortable?”
A ginger brow rose. “Merely that he understood why you desired me so much. Then he assured me the two of you had passed a woman or two between you over the decades.”
He winced. “Bloody hell.”
Tabitha didn’t ask if Nathanial had been lying. The truth was all over Raiden’s face, and pain bulldozed her. He
“He said that you wouldn’t mind if I allowed him to—”
“I mind. A great deal.” He clenched his teeth but met her gaze without flinching. “I’m sorry.”
Sorry for the behavior or sorry his father had revealed the truth to her? She shoved the thought away. “I politely refused, in case you’re wondering. But I won’t be alone with him again.”
“Hello?” Nathanial’s footsteps across the gleaming hardwood floors came closer.
Raiden didn’t hesitate. He grabbed her hand. “Let’s go.”
As always with teleporting, a loud sucking noise filled her ears. Then eerie silence. Suddenly, she lost her balance, and a sense of tumbling through air overwhelmed her. The weightlessness, the not knowing which way was up and which was down, made her slightly ill.
A moment later, they stood outside a neo-modern office building. Built in the 1960s and topping off at about five stories, the concrete structure had been carved with magical runes between each tier of white-draped windows. There wasn’t a soul in sight.
“It looks abandoned.” Eerily so, in fact.
He frowned, grabbing her hand tighter. “Indeed. Bram speculated that the Council ministries no longer use this building. Apparently, it’s been the source of human speculation, particularly the meaning of the runes.”
“I recognize some of the symbols. Magic, mastery, truth, Fate. Death.”
Raiden shrugged, his wide shoulders looking almost menacing in a dark trench. “We don’t have time to decipher it now. I have an uneasy feeling. Let’s move quickly. I don’t want you out in the open where you’re vulnerable to Mathias or any eyes he might have watching.”
“He likely has no idea where I am.”
He hustled her under the building’s portico, deep in shadow, and pinned her with a glare. “Do you really think it would take Mathias very long to figure out that your father had a daughter he hadn’t managed to kill in the attack? And that the daughter carried my child? Once he pieces all the information together, he’s going to be but a breath behind us.”
Dear God, she’d never thought of that before, but her father would have recorded her own birth. There would be no mating listed in
“Fuck.” Raiden ran a hand through his long, pale hair. “And once he starts pursuing us, I know where he’ll
